The present invention relates to photoelectrical conversion.
Conventional solid-state image detectors for color television systems are overlayed with a color filter having its striped colors in registry with an array of elemental areas where radiant energy is converted to a video signal. Due to the fact that conventional color filters are formed of organic materials, they are susceptible to exposure to heat and strong light and their lifetime is therefore shorter than the lifetime of the semiconductor imager. A further disadvantage is that the degree of precision currently attainable with organic filters is much lower than that attained in the manufacture of semiconductor devices. The manufacture of small size organic filters encounters increasing difficulty with the tendency of miniaturization. Furthermore, the spatial arrangement of primary colors limits the resolution of images. On the other hand, conventional solid-state imagers are driven by clock pulses for reading the stored picture information. However, the effort in increasing the number of picture elements for high quality images met with difficulty in providing a satisfactory driving circuit. RF interference can occur if the clock frequency is increased to drive high resolution imagers. In addition, conventional imagers do not allow parallel and random scannings.
The same holds true to solid-state display panels which currently rely on light-emitting diodes or electroluminescent devices. In comparison with cathode ray tubes, available spectral characteristics are severely limited.